


No Country for Small Ladies

by squeakinghiccups



Series: No Country for Small Ladies [1]
Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Corpse Desecration, Gen, No Country for Small Ladies, Violence, also includes some legion characters idk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-13
Updated: 2016-07-13
Packaged: 2018-07-14 20:18:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7188635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squeakinghiccups/pseuds/squeakinghiccups
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A tiny ex-slave in the Wasteland getting herself into trouble. What could go wrong?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Ain't That A Kick In The Head...

Occasionally, she wished she was born a male. It was ideal, being able to whip out a cock to take a piss, right then and there. Being a girl, there's the hassle of having to pull down the pants and squat. Not to mention the risk of being chased by radscorpions or geckos with your pants around your ankles.  
Then again, be born a male and she'd have to be a soldier for Ceaser's Legion. And that in itself was a fate worse than death.

Tugging her pants up around her waist and kicking dirt over the little wet patch she'd left in the sand, Vale continues her trek from... _Somewhere _around Mesquite Mountains towards New Vegas. The wanderer could scarcely recall the last time she had ventured to the city of bright lights and sin galore (then again, the last time she was there she was likely blind drunk), so the lure of caps and booze was tempting enough for her to take. And so off she trotted, taking the crumbled road towards Primm with the Pipboy she pilfered years ago tuned to Radio New Vegas.__

Vale walks past the Ivanpah Dry Lake when _Ain't That A Kick In The Head_ plays for the third time in two hours, and perhaps the giant ants laying dead in her wake that showed her irritation of this. She's close to screaming when a glimpse of crimson through the blowing sand of the dry lake catches her eye, and she all but throws herself to the ground.  
There's not only one patch of crimson, there's _four_. Four soldiers of Caesars Legion, so far North...  
They shouldn't be _here_.  
They shouldn't be **anywhere**.  
It's a swift motion as Vale snatches her rifle from her back and positions the hilt against her shoulder, one steely blue eye peering down the sights and at the back of one of their skulls - a scout, head unprotected from a motorcycle helmet unlike recruits and primes.  
Inhale, exhale. A half breath, and a squeeze of the trigger...

The shot rings through the valley as the .308 bullet rips through the Legionary's skull, piercing the occipital bone as the man crumples to the ground with his grey matter now considerably scrambled. The remaining three frantically scramble to find their attacker - the taller Recruit is the one to notice the discoloured lump squatting a few dozen yards away and whips out a 9mm pistol, tugging feverishly at the trigger whilst aimed at Vale's now moving form. She'd got the jump on them, leaving the squad unprepared for her assault, and the recruit's aim was off. Still, the bullets were coming too close for comfort. But rather than run away, she closes the distance; zigzagging towards her opponent while priming her second firearm - the trusty 10mm pistol with crude tallies scratched into the metal casing.  
One, two, three shots fired from Vale's weapon, the second and third bullets hitting their desired targets and making a home square in the male's neck and lower forehead. He falls, leaving his fellow, shorter Recruit rushing forward with a machete - yelling some _bullshit_ about being true to Caesar. Dumb bastard could hardly get to call her a -wench- before his own body was riddled with bullets.  
Three down, one to go.  
_One..._  
Vale peers around for a moment in an attempt to find the missing Legionary before she notices the escaping figure of the Scout, already a kilometre away as he makes his break for freedom. She'd have shot him too if it wasn't such a sorry sight - the boy would likely be flayed for abandoning the battle.  
Besides. She was low on bullets.

And so she loots the dead soldiers of their ammunition and caps (and ears, which she proceeded to pierce with the needle of an old syringe and threading onto a length of twine with nine other ears in varying states of decay) before continuing her journey towards the looming silhouette of the iconic Lucky 38 with Radio New Vegas playing all the while.


	2. The Wanderer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh thank you so much for all the kudos and hits so far! This chapter's been a long time coming - I had my tonsils removed about midway through writing and I got stuck for a few weeks, then fell into a bit of a funk. But here it is, at long last owo/

"I don't rightly know you ya got in here, little lady, but you ain't tall enough for this ride."  
The man in the checker suit taps at the woman's shoulder before recoiling slightly as the dirt and dried sweat coating her skin came away on his fingers. Honestly, what type of broad came to the tops looking like they'd never bathed in months. In hindsight, maybe it was true.  
Vale sighs at the interruption, eyes moving from the cards she held to peer at the stranger from her peripheral vision.  
"What's it t'you, dicknose?" It's a sharp response, her voice a rough drawl that sounds deeper than it should, for someone of her height.

  
"Just how old are you anyways, Doll?"  
"Dunno."  
"You dunno..." That response seems to catch Benny off guard as he goes silent for a moment before frowning deeply, more in confusion than annoyance. "What kinda damaged are you that you don't know your own age?"  
" _Slaves_ ," Vale begins, the first word coming louder than the following sentence. "ain't usually taught all that much 'bout themselves or th' world." The words are blunt, the deadpan tone concealing her own anger about the situation. "Look, 'm fuckin' _payin'_ ta be sittin' at this table, man, leave me the fuck be would ya?"  
Now, to have a dame snapping back at him was a sure way to grind Benny's gears. To make matters worse, this is a _pipsqueak_ giving him cheek. The chief of the Chairmen straightens to his full height whilst scrunching his features in disdain. Fucking brat.

So perhaps it's no surprise that Vale finds herself being shoved out the doors of the Tops faster than she can claim the situation to be a whole load of Brahmin shit, receiving a prompt fist to the face when she acts up and tries to swing at the bouncer literally _carrying_ her out the door. With wounded pride, considerably less caps than she entered The Strip with (fucking bastard wouldn't even let her cash her winnings before having her thrown out) and a freshly broken nose, Vale drags her sorry ass to the Old Mormon Fort in Freeside. From the top of her head she recalled there being doctors in the little suburb.

There's a few notable things about Vale that make her quite distinguishable.  
First of all, the girl doesn't particularly have any kind of job or home to speak of. No set address, no permanent employer, just how she likes it. No strings to tie her down, so to speak. For caps she takes up odd jobs; scavenging, mercenary escorts, supply gathering, even the odd bounty hunt to keep things interesting. With that kind of work comes a reputation around the settlements - known as the kid with a temper as short as her stature, bringing up the second point that she is particularly small.  
Standing at a neat little height of five-foot-nothing, being confused for a child has become a regular part of life. In fact it's unusual not to be mistaken for one. And so the towns regularly find the pint sized atom bomb waltzing into town at an ungodly hour, covered in the orange dust of the Mojave and blood that could be her own or not, and she disappears as suddenly as she arrives.  
So as she arrives in the Fort, a few individuals acknowledge her as though they've met her numerous times. Familiar nods and warm greetings are offered and returned in kind as she heads straight for an open tent.  
Who she finds is a particularly _unwelcome_ surprise.

"Well," a familiar looking male begins, straightening himself up at the sight of the tiny woman with blood dribbling down her chin. "We meet again. Vale, wasn't it? It's a pleasure to see you _sober_ for once. Dare I ask how the other fellow looks?"  
It takes a moment for her to recognise the Follower, yet when she does it's with a loud groan. She'd met Arcade Gannon a few times before, yet those memories were clouded and fuzzy due to the fact she'd been drunk out of her tiny skull. There's the recollection that she'd somehow managed to dislocate her shoulder in a bar brawl at Atomic Wrangler - landing her with a permanent ban from entering the premises under any circumstance - and poor Gannon had been the one to deal with her.  
" _God_ , thought I was fuckin' safe from yer smarmy ass." Her grumble comes out nasally from her fingers pinching her nose, her free hand casually shooing Arcade from his seat so she could sit.  
"Says she who enters my tent. We've been over this before; I'm not even a particularly good doctor, just a researcher." As though to reference her broken nose, the blond wags a finger at the woman's face, only to be met with a hoarse laugh from her.  
"Who says I needed y'ta fix it? Ya got any stimpaks, darlin'?"  
And with that, practised fingers snag the damaged feature and with a loud _click_ the cartilage slides back into place, eliciting a disgusted shudder from Arcade before he hands her a spare stimpak which she quickly sticks through the fabric of her singlet and into the flesh below her shoulder. The dull ache in the bridge of her nose eases within minutes and Vale quite casually drops the used device to the ground.

"So," she begins as she swings one little leg over the other, propping her elbow on her knee and her chin in her hand. "Anythin' need doin' 'round these parts, doc?".   
Arcade couldn't say that he particularly minds his visitor - his research was proving tedious at present, and despite the guest being one of the more rowdy kinds, it's a welcome distraction. A hand rubs against his chin in thought before the man finally offers a reply.  
"Now that you mention it, I've heard Judy's been growing quite concerned about a few regulars around here. If you're happy to go check on them, I'm sure that'd be more than enough as repayment."  
Vale nods, rising wordlessly before waddling off to find the mo-hawked Follower, and the details quickly become clear.

Three missing junkies; three lost people to track down. In her mind, people not particularly worth spending time nor effort in finding. But the Followers seemed to value them, and she needed to repay them for all the times they had patched her up.   
Begrudgingly, Vale wanders out of The Fort and lights a cigarette before wandering off in search of the three junkies.


End file.
